I posted this over at our family blog, but it amused me so much, I thought I’d go ahead and cross-post. Cole is my 2.5 year old son:
We had a beautiful evening – nice breeze, sun starting to set, 70 degrees. Cole and I were kicking back, winding down after a long day. He was in his toy car. I was next to him, sitting under a tree staring out over the cornfield to the south of my yard.
He looked curiously at the bottle of Negra Modelo I was holding. “That’s beer,†I told him.
“That’s beer,†he repeated, testing out the new word. He paused for a bit, thinking. “Looks delicious!†he decides.
Yes, son. Yes it is. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him use the word “delicious†before. I had to explain that it’s a “Daddy†drink.
I remember the progression of my dad’s advice on beer… its a special Daddy drink… beer is very unsfe for kids (or something to that nature)… to if I ever catch you with the stuff I’ll kill you (in JH, HS).
And I didnt touch the stuff till college. Where I nearly walked out with a BA in hops and barley.
And nothing was better then after I turned 21 and had a beer with my Dad. We partake in quite a few of em when comes to visit, especially is hes helping me around the house in good weather.
Just 18+ years to go Doug.
In my house growing up, it was a pretty quick shift from “thou shalt not drink” at age 17 to seeming vaguely offended (on the rare occasions) when I declined a beer offered by my parents.
Presumably there is a way to raise your kid so he can enjoy a good beer without necessarily feeling he has to turn college into a more or less continuous bender — which is mostly what I did in undergrad with my peak performance taking place on January 31/Feb 1, 1992 when I drank 30 beers. I only bring that up because while I was mowing yesterday and my mind was wandering, it occurred to me that that’s something like 24 pounds of beer.
Haha, wow 24 lbs? Sickest I ever got was off of too much beer. I once had equivalent of 22 shots of vodka (all in double vodka-red bulls) while in England. I was fine… yet I also didnt need to sleep for 2 days due to the caffeine.
Yeah its a balance. Its about teaching your kids to be responsible. My mom smoked and she talked alot about how hard it was to quit… I wound up never smoking (outside of a half-dozen cigars over an equal # of years). My parents leaned heavily on alcohol in terms of driving. I never drank in HS, and am terrified of getting in a car after any drinking.
Ultimately those were my decisions, my parents were good about just giving me all the info, never gave me any BS. That helps.
A friend was very embarrassed when her 4-year-old son, in response to the waitress’ question “and what would you like to drink, little guy?” answered, “what do you have on tap?” Like father, like son :-)
Yes, it is delicious. I agree. Cute story.
It’s funny but in college I lived for having a beer or especially a bourbon (or 10). Now it doesn’t even occur to me. Instead I’ve been tinkering around trying to get my pina coladas to taste like they do down in Puerto Vallarta, because I’m too busy to get down there (or go anywhere, really). Now that I’ve got it down, we’re going through some decent quantities of rum. Guess I need a vacation.